Aqib Talib Happy to Be with Broncos and Looking Forward to Bigger Things Ahead

"I've never seen anything like it."

Denver Broncos cornerback Aqib Talib has been around football a long time, and he's been in plenty of locker rooms. After playing four-plus seasons with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who selected him 20th overall in 2008 out of Kansas, Talib has since played for the New England Patriots and now the Broncos in his seven-year career. 

Yet, that's how Talib describes the Broncos locker room—that he's never seen anything like it. 

Talib took time out of his busy schedule to help promote one of his favorite pastimes, video game franchise Call of Duty and the latest installment, Advanced Warfare. As a spokesman for Call of Duty, Talib says he respects everything that goes into the game and notes how it has "improved so much" since he started playing it.  

Though many players use games like this to bond with teammates, Talib uses the game mostly to connect to his family and blow off steam. He says the Broncos locker room doesn't need it, describing the atmosphere as "a tight locker room."

"I’ve never seen guys outside of football be a real team like that. Most camaraderie that I’ve been around. The whole defense is on our side [of the locker room]. We crack jokes on each other and it’s all fun—hair, clothes, shoes. For you to be able to just sit there and joke with guys. I’ve never had that."

It may sound like the sort of thing any player is going to say about his new team or just an empty platitude, but Talib sounded both sincere and sincerely pleased at the football family he's found in Denver. He knows how rare this kind of thing can be, saying he "can't put his finger on what causes it" and that "it's hard to put the right group of guys together."

He doesn't mean any disrespect to his former teammates in New England or Tampa Bay and says about his time with the Patriots, "We had good camaraderie when I was there, and we won, but it was nothing like this."

Asked for a specific example, Talib pointed to a charter event that Broncos linebacker Von Miller held in connection with his Von's Vision nonprofit charity, which DenverBroncos.com says "helps provide eye exams, glasses, contacts and Lasik eye surgery for underprivileged children."    

It was the first "Celebrity Waiter Night," and Talib estimated that there were about 50 guys (including coaches and staff) connected to the team there, helping out on their day off. "I’ve never seen that many," Talib said. "Usually eight or nine guys show up, but 50?"

Talib puts that camaraderie toward the top of the list of things that are helping the Broncos succeed this season. His team is 5-1 through the end of Week 7 and is coming off of a tremendous 42-17 victory in which quarterback Peyton Manning broke the NFL's all-time touchdown record. 

After the tight locker room, Talib says that preparation is the main ingredient of what the Broncos have been cooking up this season. He also believes that's the major linking factor between Manning and his former quarterback, the Patriots' Tom Brady, saying that the only big difference is the offense they run. 

"Not a lot of difference in their preparation, think they’re a coach around the building," he said. "When they’re there, they’re always [moving] straight forward, going to get stuff done." 

Talib noted that level of preparation has filtered down to the rest of the team, saying that the Broncos have a higher attention to detail than he's used to. 

Asked whether he had been happy with his own play this season, Talib said that he's not...yet. He has been working on improving some of the things that had him struggling a bit in his new home after being one of the top cornerbacks in the league only a season ago. 

"I’m not [happy]. I critique myself, and I haven’t had a game this season where I thought I played well and was proud of myself. My line of scrimmage play—look at Week 6 or 7 last year and I was really comfortable on the line. I don’t see that on myself this season. It's just bad eyes, looking into the backfield—little things like that." 

After my conversation, Talib grabbed an interception (his second of the year) against the San Francisco 49ers, so maybe his self-critique is working. If it is, that's good news for a Denver defense that is already playing lights-out this season and is one of the best defenses in the league. 

If Talib is both improving his play and correct about the makeup of this team's chemistry, the Broncos could be on the path right back to another Super Bowl appearance. 

Unless otherwise noted and cited, all quotes were obtained by the author.

Michael Schottey is an NFL National Lead Writer for Bleacher Report and an award-winning member of the Pro Football Writers of America. Find more of his stuff on his archive page and follow him on Twitter.